


The End Is Where We Start From

by attaccabottoni



Category: Devil May Cry
Genre: Gen, Post-Devil May Cry 5
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-25
Updated: 2020-08-25
Packaged: 2021-03-06 21:02:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 881
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26105395
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/attaccabottoni/pseuds/attaccabottoni
Summary: Sometimes the only way to get back home is to go away from it.
Comments: 4
Kudos: 56





	The End Is Where We Start From

**Author's Note:**

> Title is from Little Gidding by T. S. Eliot.
> 
> Written to commemorate the 19th anniversary of the release of Devil May Cry 1, as well as the 19th anniversary of Dante killing his brother. Don’t worry, it has a happy ending.

As their strikes met in equal force, it threw them both in the opposite directions at a short distance away where they fell on their backs, signaling this round ending in a draw.

Dante groaned, not even having the energy to keep his grip on his sword as he banished it, the impact still reverberating on his right arm as he flexed his fingers. He weighed the effort of coming up with a pithy commentary about their current score to get a rise out of Vergil, when his brother uncharacteristically decided to be the first to break the silence.

“Why did you tell Nero about me?”

Even if he could feel his utter exhaustion in his teeth, that he shouldn’t move his face when there’s no one to see it, Dante furrowed his brow in confusion. “What d’you mean? I wasn’t gonna lie to him about you.”

“You could have let him go on assuming he was your son, and would have been none the wiser.”

It has been close to two decades already, yet the cold bitterness at the thought of Mallet Island leaked out to his voice. “That is, until he found out that the man he assumed was his father was actually his father’s killer.”

“But he trusts you. It wouldn’t have mattered what you did to me, hypothetically I would have been nothing to him but a bad memory.”

He didn’t know what made him angrier, Vergil’s casual disregard of himself, or whatever it was that caused Vergil’s inability to see Nero’s good heart. For all he knew, they were the same thing. “If you think for one second that Nero cares more about me than he does about you, then you’re a bigger dumbass than I thought.”

“Being your son would make him far happier. And so would you.”

It wasn’t Dante’s style to be punchy with his words, but at the face of Vergil’s matter-of-fact tone, he couldn’t help himself. “Well maybe I‘d rather neither of us were happy, if that meant cutting you off from our lives. How‘s that for a hypothetical?”

Vergil kept pursuing his point, like he didn’t care if Dante’s voice was already sounding hoarse from emotion. “If Nero hadn’t stopped us, weren’t you prepared to do it anyway?”

“But he did stop us. Haven’t you learned by now? You don’t get to have your way and think your choices will not affect others. That’s not how this works, Vergil.”

“How what works, exactly?”

“Family.”

Dante was grateful that Vergil took the time to let that loaded word sink in during a long pause, until he spoke. “I left that behind a long time ago.”

“Even if you did, it turned out that it was right where you left it.” Dante took a deep breath, and soldiered on despite his misgivings. “You can have it back, if you wanted. Or it just might decide to hunt you down and kick you in the ass, regardless.”

Vergil chuckled. It was a short sound of the self-aware, and Dante had to hide the wide grin threatening to break the moment.

The familiar sound of Yamato being sheathed rang through the air as he heard further noises of Vergil getting on his feet. “Let’s go.”

“Go where?”

“I left my book behind. I’m going to get it back.”

Dante allowed his eyes to close briefly. The feeling of fragile hope ballooned in his chest. He tended to distrust it, but maybe he could give it a chance this one time.

So he rose up, stretched, and waited until Vergil strode to his side before clapping him soundly on the shoulder. “Sounds like you’ve got a good plan, for once. Can’t wait to see how it goes.”

* * *

Nero abruptly sneezed, the force of it made him lift his feet up from the dashboard of the van.

“That was loud,” Nico drawled from her workbench at the back. “I think every demon in Red Grave heard it. Someone is probably talking about you right now.”

It sounded like one of those things that Nico kept ribbing Nero about for not knowing, like he was a naive country bumpkin and she was just the right worldly city dweller who could teach him things. Nero thought about saying something rude, but his curiosity won out. “What?”

“I bet Dante is telling your old man all about you, and how your smelling like ass every day keeps the demons away.”

“That’s you. Guess which of us here has taken a shower already? You’ve probably forgotten what soap looks like at this rate.”

“Haha, very funny.”

There was a brief pause before Nero asked lightly, “You think they’re talking about me?”

“If they’re not too busy fighting, I guess.”

Nero could only imagine it all too clearly, that it made him put his feet down in his sudden rage. “They better not be killing each other again, or I swear, I’m gonna crack their heads together when I see them!”

* * *

Dante sneezed at the same time Vergil did, and it caused them to look at each other quizzically.

“Is there a pollen season in the Underworld?”

“I don’t think so.”

Gazing at the same direction in front of them, they both missed the twin looks of foreboding crossing their faces.

**Author's Note:**

> [Twitter](https://twitter.com/semperlenity/status/1298290787508133888) ♥️


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